Do My Own Lawn Care Episode 17 How to Apply Fungicides

By DoMyOwn staff

Fungus or disease in the yard can become one of the toughest and most annoying problems to solve. Best way to stop them is to prevent them before they even become a problem. In this video, Paul will go over when, what kind and how to apply fungicides in the lawn.

Video Transcript

And I want to keep it that way. Green and beautiful and looking really really healthy.

So what we're going to talk about today is fungicides. No, I don't have a disease problem in the yard and that's exactly why I'm going to put down a fungicide.

You see, when it comes to fungicides, there's two ways of using them. There's preventative and there's curative. And the latter is much much harder to deal with. Therefore, we want to do a preventative app.

Preventative fungicides are going to head the disease off before it settles into the yard and becomes a problem. And then there's curative fungicides. They're going to effect the disease after its already set in.

Now it's much much harder to do a curative application than it is a preventative application. Which is why we recommend doing a preventative app before you notice a disease setting in. You don't want to catch something or see signs of something settling and then get out a fungicide and try to tackle it. It's going to be much much more difficult to do it that way.

There are different kinds of fungicides that you can use in and around your yard. Let's first talk about contact versus systemic.

Contact fungicides; these are you protectants. They're not going to be absorbed by the plant rather they're going to stick to the plant surfaces. They provide a protective barrier that prevents the fungus from getting into plant and damaging the tissues.

Then you've got your systemic or other wise known as your penetrate fungicides. These will be able to move up through the plant from the area that you applied them.

The other thing to keep in mind with fungicides is the mode of action or in other words, how the fungicide effects the fungus.

Some will work by damaging the cell membrane of the fungus, while others will inhibit the fungus growth.

Now it's important to use different modes of action by either mixing or alternating the products you're using in your fungicide applications. And the reason that's important is we want to maintain the effectiveness of the fungicide and prevent fungicide resistance in our plants. Meaning we don't want to use the same thing over and over again and allow our plants to become immune to that fungicide. So it's important to mix and alternate the products that you're using in your applications.

Before we rip open the bag and dump the product into my spreader and start getting it out into the yard, let's first go over a couple more rules of thumb when it comes to fungicide use.

If we're going curative, you need to diagnose it properly. So in other words know the disease problem that you've got that's causing the fungus problem in the yard.

Second and probably always the most crucial thing when it comes to using professional grade products, read the label!

Remember, label is law!

This will not only protect your plants but it will protect your health and the environment and it is by far the most crucial thing that you should do. Read the label.

Also always remember to use the right equipment and ppe, personal protection equipment, when applying fungicides and also apply it by the recommended rate on the label.

And the third thing, follow the recommendation of when and how often you should apply the fungicide. Just like all the other products we're using, the actual timing of the application is going to really enhance the effectiveness of it and reduce the amount of times we're going to have to re-apply.

Just like all the other pro products that we sell and we use in and around the yard, the label is going to tell you the recommended rates, how often you should apply, the timing of the application, the ingredients, the mode of action, all of that good stuff is going to be on the label. So again, read the label! Know what you're using and how to use it.

For the product that I'm using, there is a different application rate for each disease. Anywhere from two pounds to five pounds per 1,000 square feet. Now having said that, this particular product label states that Bermuda grass is very sensitive to this fungicide. So I'm going to use the lowest usage rate to make sure I do not harm my grass and undo all of the hard work I've done so far.

And that is our preventative fungicide application.

You can very easily misdiagnose a fungal disease in plants and in the yard. I would highly recommend reaching out to our customer service staff and discussing with them the issues that you are either starting to see or maybe you've had in the past and you want to prevent.

They can do a very good job of recommending a treatment program for either your lawn or your garden or what ever it is that you're trying to take care of.

Other things to keep in mind when it comes to plant diseases, they're often transmitted when leaves are wet, so ground level watering and good air circulation can be used to keep leaves dry.

Also pruning shears and other tools can carry plant diseases from one plant to another, so you should learn about doing good garden sanitation to prevent spreading the disease yourself.

Although they can slow and even stop the disease, most fungicides are designed and most effective as a preventative measure. All the more reason to do a preventative application. Curative applications can solve the problem for you, but it will take twice as long and probably cost you twice as much as if you were to do a preventative app and stop the disease before it gets into the yard or garden or plants or whatever it is that you don't want effected.

Hope that answers some good questions for you on how to use fungicides, if you have any other questions please feel free to leave them in the comments section below, email or customer service staff, or pick up the phone and give them a buzz.

Make sure to subscribe to the channel by clicking this button right here, you can click this playlist to see all the videos that we've done in the series so far, and we also started a new gardening series, so go check those videos out by clicking this playlist right here.